Can I Use Onstar To Make Phone Calls Without Paying For The Service

We all have heard of OnStar. Most automotive consumers are enlightened of what the company offers users and subscribers via the endless number of tv commercials produced over the years. They range from humorous Tiger Forest examples to the more serious "We've-been-in-an-blow" spots.

I'yard going to try non to bore readers a great bargain on the specifics of OnStar. What I want to talk well-nigh is if this concept really works.

What Is OnStar?

OnStar came into inception in 1996 on college-end General Motors vehicles and offered drivers easily-free communication also as an innovative safety device in example the inevitable happens. Today, OnStar has over 5 meg subscribers, is offered in over fifty different GM vehicles, and offers a vast assortment of options.

How OnStar works is, but, the organisation utilizes both Global Positioning Satellites (GPS) as well equally wireless telephone technology to locate your vehicle wherever you may be and help you lot receive anything from turn-by-turn directions to vehicle diagnostics to emergency services in case the vehicle has been in an accident.

What Does OnStar Offer?

Surprisingly, a lot. Press the middle bluish button located below the rearview mirror and the phonation of a human person (not an automated machine) comes through the speakers and assists you lot with anything yous may need, depending on your plan.

Directions to Grandma's? No problem. Traveling and need to make overnight accommodations? OnStar can help you. Engine non running smoothly? OnStar can let you know what is wrong with the vehicle and straight you lot to the nearest dealership.

The system tin even unlock your doors if the keys become locked in the vehicle also as beep the horn if you forget where the vehicle is located. (If subscribed to both OnStar and XM satellite radio, users can access live traffic and weather condition updates for the city they are located in.)

Additionally, the button with the red cross offers emergency aid if you are in an accident or need whatever sort of police/medical assistance. If the vehicle is in a severe accident where the airbags go off, OnStar will automatically call emergency services besides as call you to check on the occupants of the vehicle. If y'all are the unfortunate victim of car theft, OnStar can track the vehicle and can irksome the vehicle down.

Onstar gauges

Finally, the button on the left controls your hands-free phone. If you so desire, the automobile'south cellular device can be added on to your Verizon Wireless cell phone program and employ the car's system instead of trying to drive while trying to hold that little glowing piece of plastic to your face (i.due east. much safer). (Y'all may also purchase minutes straight from OnStar as well.)

What Does OnStar Cost?

According to OnStar, you can opt for a few unlike options. For $19.99 per calendar month ($200/yr), subscribers have access to all the safety communication features equally well as navigation, vehicle unlock and Roadside Assistance. This is called the Protection Plan.

For an boosted $5 a calendar month ($24.99/month; $250/year), users tin can access everything listed in a higher place besides as Stolen Vehicle Assistance.

If you want OnStar'southward plow-by-turn directions and their concierge service chosen AtYourService which allows subscribers to find the nearest hotels and have them book it for yous, get tickets to an issue, or check your mutual fund prices on the New York Stock Exchange, you lot'll need to fork up$34.99/month ($350/year).

Please annotation, pricing is accurate as I write this article.

Is OnStar Worth It?

I have had a lot of time to mull this over, and gave the system a thorough test-drive while I was behind the cycle of Automoblog's 2009 GMC Acadia examination vehicle, and I have come to the conclusion that yep, OnStar is a worthy system, simply there are some aspects which requite me pause.

In that location are a lot of positives to using OnStar. For one, is so simple to operate. Instead of fumbling around with a GPS organisation, you simply printing a button and permit someone else do the work. You still have all the convenience of an everyday system, but it is much easier and much simpler to operate.

This is especially disquisitional when you are traveling at highway speeds, where taking your eyes off the road for a split second to fumble with a navigation system, read a paper, punch a phone, etc. tin can lead to an unplanned disaster.

Onstar mirror button

Speaking of prophylactic, the Emergency Services offered should make OnStar important enough to subscribe. Having the comfort to know that if you are involved in an accident, help will exist sent whether y'all call for it or not.

In addition, if the car is stolen, OnStar can help you end the perpetrators from getting away with your vehicle and get it dorsum safely. That would certainly assistance lower car thefts as well equally keep insurance premiums depression.

Finally, in today'southward earth of e-mail, text messages, and other forms of depression human being interaction, it is reassuring to know when pressing the blue button, there is an actual living, breathing person on the other stop.

I really enjoyed the thought of knowing that with i press of a push, someone will be there to help me with whatever I may demand. No computers to blazon to, no automated voices with hundreds of sub-menus to get through.

OnStar graph

Don't let these positives ensue this organization in perfect. There are a few modest problems as well as one gaping issue.

Beginning, the toll. For a i-year subscription with OnStar, subscribers could buy themselves a very nice, portable GPS unit of measurement, filled with hundreds of thousands of $.25 of data and technology which is displayed on a crisp color screen instead of on the tiny radio brandish. It's non exactly what I would call affordable.

Also, there will be times when the boring effort of dealing with vocalisation-activated menus. For example, using the telephone feature requires the user to say the number or the pre-stored proper name, confirm the number/proper noun, and and then again confirm to call. And information technology'south the same if the commuter wants to find out the traffic reports.

OnStar Reviews

The really big issue with OnStar comes from a worry about "Big Brother". Many speculate that OnStar and GM can employ the ability to know where your machine is and where y'all are traveling to calculate data on speed and driving characteristics, which can exist used by law and automobile insurance companies to issue fines and increment premiums, depending on the state of affairs.

Back in 2008, GM's financial co-operative GMAC announced information technology uses information received by OnStar which allows drivers to receive a discount on their GMAC insurance. What occurs is the driver signs upwardly for the program, where they will receive an xi percent discount.

So, a monthly argument is forwarded to GMAC with a mileage calculation. The fewer miles you lot drive, the bigger your discount is, according to a General Motors printing release. To some, this may exist a great style to save money. Others see it as another fashion to pry.

Other OnStar reviews online bear witness a huge problem with their billing practices and terrible customer service. If you read some of the comments on this article, yous'll run across exactly how polarized this issue is.

Many customers are getting charged automatically for services they didn't sign up for, or are accusing OnStar of not cancelling their service when they tried to cancel, even multiple times. Multiple customers have even claimed that they started being charged for their service without fifty-fifty providing a credit card number!

Like everything else in this world, naught is perfect. There are always going to be concessions. How many, and how large, of a concession are people willing to take for a service that, in theory, works?

OnStar Website